COAL AND CANDLELIGHT
... ἔχω δέ τοι ὄσσ' ἑν ὀνείρῳ φαίνονται.—
Theocritus, ix. Idyll.
BEFORE they left their mirth's warm scene
And slept, I heard my children say
That moonlight, like a duck's egg, green,
Outside the enfolding curtains lay.
But hearth-bound by maternal choice,
The fire-side's eremite, I know
The nightfall less by sight than voice—
How wake the huffing winds, and how
More full the flooded stream descends,
In unarrested race of sound,
The lasher where the river bends
To circle in our garden ground.
Within I harbour, hap what hap
Without, and o'er my baby brood:
Who, newly slumbering on my lap,
Stirs in resentful quietude.
Her little shawl-swathed fists enfold
One cherished forefinger of mine;
Her callow hair with Tuscan gold
Is pencilled in the candle-shine;
Her cheeks' sweet heraldry, exprest
Each evening since her happy birth,
Is argent to her mother's breast
And gules to the emblazoning hearth;
Only the lashes of her eyes
Some ancient discontent impairs,
Which, for their abdicated skies,
Are pointed with forgotten tears.
And so, as simple as a bird,
She nestles—there is no child else
To rouse her with a reckless word
Or clink her rattle's fallen bells:
All, long dismissed with wonted prayers,
Such apostolic vigils keep,
No sound descends the darkened stairs
To question the allure of sleep.
Only their fringèd towels veil
The fender's interwoven wire,
And, parted in the midst, exhale
Domestic incense towards the fire.
Betwixt the hobs (their lease of light,
But not of heat, devolved to dark)
The elm-logs simmer, hoary white
Or ruddy-scaled with saurian bark.
'Twas the third George whose lieges planned
That grate, and all its iron caprice
Of classic garlands, nobly spanned
By that triumphant mantelpiece—
A very altar for the bright
Tame element its pomp installs
'Twixt flat pilasters, fluted, white,
And lion-bedizened capitals.
Here portly topers met of old
To serve their comfortable god
And praise the heroes wigged and jowled,
Of that pugnacious period.
Now in their outworn husk of state
Our frugal comfort oddly dwells—
(As recluse crabs accommodate
Their contours to discarded shells)
A dozen childish perquisites
Await my liberated hands
And lovelier usurpation sits
Enthroned above the fading brands,
Two lonely tapers criss-cross rays
Cancel the dusky wall and shine
To halo with effulgent haze
The Genius of this Georgian shrine.
Mary, who through the centuries holds
Her crown'd Son in her hand, amid
Her mantle's black Byzantine folds
More tenderly displayed than hid,
O'er this tramontane hearth presides
Oracular of Heaven and Rome—
Where Peter is the Church abides,
Where Mary and Her Son, the home.
All day she blesses my employ
Where surge and eddy round my knee,
Swayed by a comfit or a toy,
The battles of eternity.
And that regard of Hers and His,
Hallowing the truce of night, endows
The weariest vigilant head with bliss;
And sanctifies such sleeping brows
As hers I carry from the haunt
Of waning warmth, the empty bars,
Up the great staircase, 'neath the gaunt
North window with its quarrelled stars,
To the quiet cradle. Slumber on,
Small heiress of celestial peace,
The glitter of the world is gone,
Et lucet lux in tenebris.